Calling Bullshit

'Tis the season. I love the way the internet makes it so easy to get a wide audience when you have a cause to mount...and it is a sacred duty to call it when you see it, I feel. I am almost always proud of people who can see through the fog and go for the truth even when it causes people to squirm uncomfortably and issue their denials and rationalizations. And I can say that I welcome it when it happens to me, but that's a bit more complicated. Nobody likes to be called a liar, however gently, and when you apply some compassion you can usually see how they got to their false assumption or why they are interested in spreading the faulty information.

There is so much of this going around my world right now! I do welcome the discussions of white privilege and white fragility and feminism and how it works in politics and our personal lives. I have about as many prejudices and misconceptions as the average TV-raised white American, well, not average, because average is dumb, (I think George Carlin gets the credit for that) but I do fall into the pits of not-knowing fairly regularly. It can be embarrassing, but actually I struggle a lot more with stopping myself from the calling of the bullshit.

I want to do it right. The bullshit usually hurt someone, and I don't want to hurt someone else in exchange, and there is also the self-protection piece. I'm vulnerable, and can have plenty to lose by standing up in certain ways, because the world is not fair, and the standard-bearers get shot down as quickly as those who are less righteous and willing to carry that particular flag. And sometimes I am complicit in the benefits gained from the spreading of the bullshit...except that I don't stomach that well. Moral ambiguity is a land where maybe no one should be too comfortable.

My latest gut-churner is the continuing repeat of the lie that Lane County Farmers' Market is 100 years old. Why do they keep doing that? I get that they want to strengthen their brand and not keep depending on Saturday Market to define the corner with our giant advertising budget (that's sarcasm), I get that they have been working on their own identity. That's not a bad thing in itself. There's a lot to celebrate in 30 years of bringing farmers to downtown. But the fact is that without Saturday Market they would not exist. It's printed right there on our website in our history, so except for maybe their new Director, they can't say they don't know it isn't true. Even she ought to have read every word on that website since we are such tight neighbors and have been so for so long. So there's that aspect, and one reason I haven't gone public really, because it makes SM look kind of petty if we bring it up. We know who we are, and what we did.

But every time they say it on TV or in the newspaper I just cringe and get angry. Why not mention us? Why not celebrate that synergy that we all benefit from, why not show how far they have come from those hippie roots like we do? There's something dark in them trying to dismiss us. It's kind of revisionist. I'm an amateur Eugene historian, and I don't see the purpose or benefit of rewriting history from a community perspective. Why can't we all work together for mutual benefit? We always have all this time. The relationships across the street are strong on both sides. Everyone with any observations skills can see how it all works for all of us.
But I try to keep quiet. I want them to be successful and stay over there on that block. I want all that to continue for my own benefit. I've been welcomed to sell at the Tuesday Market for many years and I don't want to feel unwelcome.

There was a time when I tried to call bullshit on them when I was taking minutes at their meetings, and when the 8th St. closure was a quietly fought issue in the city, and I know I made some enemies over there. I was defending my life and it's viability, I thought, so I tried to keep my head with so much at stake, and it seemed that we all managed to grow past that and be friends again. I have to admit that I still am wary, though, of just what might happen in their drive to grow that might hurt me. I liked it better when I knew they would never do anything to compromise my own organization. That trust needs to be fostered and tended. So I'm still trying to do that on my own part, trust that indeed whatever happens will also benefit me and my own organization and all of it's 600 plus members. We matter a lot, and surely that is understood by the farmers, the city, and the county.

But I have to call bullshit on Mike Clark, too, when I watch him in action on the City Council. I don't think he cares a bit what might happen to Saturday Market, or even the farmers, when he brings remodeling the Park Blocks to the agenda. I think he wants to promote himself as a great mayoral candidate. I think he would be a disaster for me, quite possibly, because I heard him say his model and vision for the Park Blocks is Oakway Mall. I guess maybe he has never been to Saturday Market.

I could go on, but I'm supposed to be working. I just had to get this off my chest so I could go earn some more money with my honest work of making things from nothing. I'm proud of my right livelihood, as all of us should be who weathered recessions by creating jobs for ourselves and have continued to make our priceless contributions to the culture of Eugene and Lane County and to improve the lives of all of our visitors from all over the world. We have so much to be proud of! We should be honored and have other organizations and businesses downtown fighting for space to be next to us. Talk about downtown revitalization...what else happens on Saturdays down there? A lot these days, but go back to the 70's and 80's and even the 90's. All this shiny new stuff is here because we have stuck with our little 8x8s and made this work.

All of our fees are the only income Saturday Market has ever had to do all of the things we have ever done. We pay rent to the City, and we used to pay it to the County until they kind of threw us under the bus with what's happening over at the FSP. We ought to feel that honoring once in awhile, of creating all of that through our common effort. I call bullshit on everyone who criticizes us by saying we are boring old hippies who never change. Come down and see what is new every week. Bring money. Build community in a place where people like to be honest and forthright and independent and put their hands and hearts together to create something wonderfully new and precious. Every week.

And after you go to Saturday Market, come to the Jell-O Art Show. See something that has happened for 28 years that is unlike anything else in the whole damn world. See me and my friends produce an event that is pure delight and no bullshit. You know you need to see it for yourself once in awhile, or you might just start believing the PR too. Come and check out the real thing. You are so lucky that you can.

Representing the Real Story

Here it is Saturday night and my emotions are all over the range. Somebody should clean off that range as well as the rest of my kitchen, ha ha. I'm feeling that almost all of the organizations I am involved in are stumbling around in muddy flood waters these days. I know that this is just a feeling because I am seeing upset people, hurt people, struggling for understanding and feeling betrayed, pushed, or just confused. There is a lot in play. I probably see too much, because it's my job to sit in meetings and write down what is said and done. I have to pay close attention.

I don't get to space out or make jokes or laugh things off, I have to decide if they are important, and if they are, how to state them in a neutral way that will neither alarm nor hide the truth, and I have to spell it right as well. I think I'm pretty good at it in a long-winded fashion, although writing sentences in the passive voice is probably doing permanent damage to the fiction-writing part of my brain. I know I am dedicated to it, and mostly I enjoy it as a way to make sense and put an order to things that are seldom completely orderly.

Both of the main organizations I'm talking about here are member organizations. That's a special kind of club that not everyone gets to engage in. I have multiple roles in both, the two economic ones of being a boothholder and an independent service provider, plus as I have been there a long time I have a nuanced emotional role of being an elder who has seen the patterns and worst and best times. It's not like I've seen it all, just like I don't hear or see all in the meetings as I focus on my notes and listen and transcribe the recording. It's limited by who I am and how I do things, so it's a way of participation that is as limited as anyone else's, in a way, and keeps it in my mind that even I do not have the whole picture, even when I am looking and listening so closely.

Everybody has a piece of the truth, we like to say in group participation activities, but no one has the full truth. I don't know what full truth is. Reality is shifty. Time makes it elusive, and all of the structure we try to impose on our reality is colored by our perspective and our emotional construction that we see as our operating reality. We all operate as if we agree on it, while at the same time knowing that we certainly can't be in agreement when it isn't even the same color. That blue dress/white dress thing pointed that out so clearly on computers, and it is pointed out clearly in our meetings and personal interactions because they don't flow as smoothly as we might wish.

Of course there are people who don't try to make things be smooth for reasons of their own, be they conscious or sub-. There's an attraction to "juice" both fun and negative. Some people thrive on drama. Some avoid it and shut down when it appears. Personally, I guess I am fascinated by it, but don't want to get any of it on me. I like to read the long posts and see what people are saying on Facebook, but I don't have the fortitude to really take a stand and be assailed for it, very often.

But recently I have found myself giving impassioned defenses of a certain man in my large local family who is the target of a lot of negative talk. I've known him for over 40 years but I would not presume to say I know him as I do my own self. Yet I know what most of his core character traits are, and I know him to be a man who has spent his whole life serving others, bringing others in whether or not they could return anything to him in the way he gives. I've heard him say a cynical thing now and then, but always with humor, and underlying that is a giant amount of compassion and respect for all of his fellow beings.

He's almost died a couple of times. One time he came out of his tent to find a large branch nearly on his tent. One time he had a failing organ and it was only the pleas of others that got him to accept one from a donor. He is one of the most humble men I know, while at the same time being a powerful, magnetic person. Our birthdays are six months apart: I am a Taurus, and he is a Scorpio. We have a connection that we have only explored a little in the past, which my damage did not allow to flourish on the intimate level, but this man is a consummate art patron, and he has nurtured my artistic self in a beautiful way over time.

I was his go-to screenprinter for most of these 40 years. I printed for his wrestlers and his businesses and painted signs too. One autumn I got the most wonderful job of painting and stenciling on a treehouse he put up at his home for his young daughter. This was a huge project, and like all of his projects he allowed a lot of latitude in how it was done. I covered the panels and borders of the structure with gold paint in exquisite, graceful designs with a general theme and origin of what is known as the Gypsy wagon. Gypsy wagons Of course today we wouldn't call it that...I guess something like Romanian style art on a caravan is better.
It was and I assume still is incredibly beautiful. I'm not the only artist who worked on it, but this man treats all of his artists with a great deal of respect, and they are truly a collaboration using his money. As I recall on that one I spent over 100 hours but really couldn't bear to charge him for all of my work. I knew at the time I would probably never again get to work on such a cool project.

And all of this man's projects, that he pays for, are like that. The coolest, the most elaborate, the like-nothing-else, over-the-top projects. Usually they have a practical aspect as well, like the dwelling I worked on, the t-shirts, or the signs. He also walks around the Market and the Fair and buys art from a lot of people. I don't know anyone else who is so much of an art supporter. This man is not rich. He doesn't live in a shiny house or drive a new car. He grows his own food and feeds a lot of people. He supports a lot of people, when they need it, or because they are part of his tribe, his clan. His family.

Most of his work for pay has been to create living spaces for people with disabilities so that they can maximize their independence. I know he was a wrestling coach for many years, as well as a wrestler. I think of that as such a primal and intimate contact contest, practically naked men applying strength and leverage and mental power to each other's bodies in a simple and complex way. Of course, like me, he is now an oldish person. We don't have a lot of years left, but we have in common that we have dedicated much of them to using our particular gifts and talents to serve others and create beauty. I remember when he made a casket for Jed Kesey he said he thought if the powerful people in that circle knew him, they probably wouldn't like him, but I didn't know what he meant. I think now he meant because he took life really seriously and they were all up in their pranks and their highs and he was down on the earth, working. He loves wood, and joinery, and fine work and craftsmanship of any kind. He really admires other people's ability to express themselves with their hands. He always wants to make things that haven't been made before, especially if they bring people together in a special way. They made the coins so that there would be a special way to participate, as well as a special thing to collect. Nobody needs half of the stuff he has had made, but lots of people want it and treasure it.

His legacy at the Fair is astounding in its scope and complexity. I can see why people would feel jealous of him, as he can  motivate a lot of people to carry out his visions and they do it willingly and with joy. He can always get more workers who want to be a part of what he creates. It isn't because of anything like money. He inspires people to do their best work, and to put their hearts into it. He inspires service given from the heart. He shares his great love for the beautiful world with anyone who wants a piece of it. Making a place for people to get clean is such a pure, giving thing for the family. We've been saved from so many epidemics and so much happiness has been shared by all of those clean folks.

How anyone can accuse this person of thoughtlessness or any negative intentions is way beyond me. I'm ashamed of my community when they say his life's work should be appropriated by the Fair and destroyed. I don't care about the story pole, per se. I don't actually like it as an art piece, and I do think there are cultural appropriation issues with some of the art styles used in his domain. But I know that when you approach this man with respect, he is the most reasonable person there is. He is evolved, and he isn't finished evolving. He has a clear heart and mind and loves very deeply. He has no intention to hurt anyone, and I have never known him to do a mean or thoughtless thing. So if only the controversy would have started there, with a gentle inquiry, with a soulful discussion, with a request for understanding. And if nobody would be saying that he is greedy, that his service is for his own profit, that he grabs land and does things without permission, that would be good. Have you noticed that the land he uses is for seating and music, showers and the drain fields to keep people healthy? He rents land for his family to park in. Do you? Do you give back what you take from Fair? Do you support the craftspeople and food booths, the Board members and the people who do all the hard work? Or do you just come on the Facebook site and rave about how fun it is to get high and hear music and wear costumes? Or do you just not work on your own evolution so that you can clearly see when a person has heart and when he is being misrepresented.

Because this man could probably still pin you to the mat, but he wouldn't. I'm guessing he is listening to everything people are saying, and when someone comes from a heart like his, he hears it. I'm guessing he wants to do the best for the community he has been a part of his whole adult life. He has not picked up his art pieces and walked away, has he? He has not piled it in a bonfire to spite anyone, has he? As far as I know he hasn't even made a public statement yet. But when he does feel ready to speak to this issue and to act on it, you will cry. When I saw him speak so tenderly in that Path Planning video, he was nothing but sweet. I love the man. He isn't going to be here forever. He deserves the honor of being treated like the man he has grown to be. I challenge all his detractors to step back and see the man. I feel sad as can be that people don't even know to do this. I hope that I do not ever suffer this type of betrayal by the people who are so quick to call themselves Fair Family. Because I doubt I will be as patient and kind as this man will be throughout this. I trust this to be true, and I hope with all my heart that I am right. I have faith in him, and I am loyal to him as he has been to all of his artists and workers.

We'll all see how this heartbreaking situation is resolved. I hope that it is well done. I agree that we all need to learn about this and make this right, but it should be at no one's expense. We all need to rise to our better selves. Our best selves. Honor the honorable. It's not a simple thing with simple answers. It's not a passive sentence that will put the minutes in order to frame the meeting in a businesslike way. It's our messy selves being messy and trying to love and be loved. Don't think it is about anything simple. This time, right now, is not a time of simple answers. Something big is happening here, kind of an emotional tsunami. Let's weather it, and not let everything wash out to sea that we have so lovingly built.